Zond 3, launched July 18, 1965, was a Soviet space probe which made a flyby of the moon, but was originally intended travel to Mars during the 1964 launch window. The opportunity was lost so the Soviets decided to send it on a mission to cross Mars' orbit even though the planet was no longer there.
I'm sure it made sense in 1965.
Zond 3 flew by the moon on July 20 and then proceeded to Mars' orbit. The Soviets were able to test the telemetry from the probe and determine that it operated successfully for 228 days, about the time needed to travel to the Red Planet, and more than enough time to travel to Venus.
Radio contact was lost on March 3, 1965 when it was over 95.4 million miles away.
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